The Gulag Archipelago

by Alexander Solzhenitsyn

  27. Beatings—of a kind that leave no marks. They use rubber truncheons, and they use wooden mallets and small sandbags. It is very, very painful when they hit a bone—for example, an interrogator's jackboot on the shin, where the bone lies just beneath the skin. They beat Brigade Commander Karpunich-Braven for twenty-one days in a row. And today he says: "Even after thirty years all my bones ache—and my head too." In recollecting his own experience and the stories of others, he counts up to fifty-two methods of torture. Here is one: They grip the hand in a special vise so that the prisoner's palm lies flat on the desk—and then they hit the joints with the thin edge of a ruler. And one screams! Should we single out particularly the technique by which teeth are knocked out? They knocked out eight of Karpunich's.

  [In the case of the Secretary of the Karelian Provincial Party Committee, G. Kupriyanov, arrested in 1949, some of the teeth they knocked out were just ordinary ones, of no particular account, but others were gold. At first they gave him a receipt that said his gold teeth were being kept for him. And then they caught themselves just in time and took away his receipt.]

  As everyone knows, a blow of the fist in the solar plexus, catching the victim in the middle of a breath, leaves no mark whatever. The Lefortovo Colonel Sidorov, in the postwar period, used to take a "penalty kick" with his overshoes at the dangling genitals of male prisoners. Soccer players who at one time or another have been hit in the groin by a ball know what that kind of blow is like. There is no pain comparable to it, and ordinarily the recipient loses consciousness.

  [In 1918 the Moscow Revolutionary Tribunal convicted the former Tsarist jailer Bondar. The most extreme measure of his cruelty that was cited was the accusation that "in one case he had struck a political prisoner with such force that his eardrum had burst." (Krylenko, op. cit., p. 16.)]

  28. In the Novorossisk NKVD they invented a machine for squeezing fingernails. As a result it could be observed later at transit prisons that many of those from Novorossisk had lost their fingernails.

  29. And what about the strait jacket?

  30. And breaking the prisoner's back? (As in that same Khabarovsk GPU in 1933.)

  31. Or bridling (also known as "the swan dive")? This was a Sukhanovka method—also used in Archangel, where the interrogator Ivkov applied it in 1940. A long piece of rough toweling was inserted between the prisoner's jaws like a bridle; the ends were then pulled back over his shoulders and tied to his heels. Just try lying on your stomach like a wheel, with your spine breaking—and without water and food for two days!

  Is it necessary to go on with the list? Is there much left to enumerate? What won't idle, well-fed, unfeeling people invent?

  Brother mine! Do not condemn those who, finding themselves in such a situation, turned out to be weak and confessed to more than they should have. ... Do not be the first to cast a stone at them.

  But here's the point! Neither these methods nor even the "lightest" methods of all are needed to wring testimony from the majority ... for iron jaws to grip lambs who are unprepared and longing to return to their warm hearths. The relationship of forces to situations is too unequal.

  Oh, in how new a light does our past life appear when re-examined in the interrogator's office: abounding in dangers, like an African jungle. And we had considered it so simple!

  You, A, and your friend, B, have known each other for years and have complete faith in one another. When you met, you spoke out boldly about political matters large and small. No one else was present. There was no one who could have overheard you. And you have not denounced each other—not at all.

  But at this point, for some reason, you, A, have been marked, hauled out of the herd by the ears, and arrested. And for some reason—well, maybe not without a denunciation on somebody's part, and not without your apprehensions as to the fate of your loved ones, and not without a certain lack of sleep, and not without a bit of punishment cell—you have decided to write yourself off but at the same time not to betray anyone else at any price.

  You have therefore confessed in four depositions, and signed them—declaring yourself to be a sworn enemy of Soviet power—because you used to tell jokes about the Leader, because you thought there should be a choice of candidates at elections, because you went into the voting booth only in order to cross out the name of the only candidate and would have done so except there was no ink in the inkwell, and because there was a 16-meter band on your radio on which you tried to catch parts of Western broadcasts through the jamming. Your own tenner has been assured, yet your ribs have remained whole, and so far you have not caught pneumonia. You have not sold anyone out; and it seems to you that you have worked things out sensibly. You have already informed your cellmates that in your opinion your interrogation is probably coming to an end.

  But lo and behold! Admiring his own handwriting, and with deliberation, the interrogator begins to fill out deposition No. 5. Question: Were you friendly with B? Answer: Yes. Question: Were you frank with him about politics? Answer: No, no, I did not trust him. Question: But you met often? Answer: Not very. Question: What does that mean, not very? According to testimony from your neighbors, he was at your house on such and such a day, and on such and such, and on such and such just in the past month. Was he? Answer: Maybe. Question: And it was observed that on these occasions, as always, you did not drink, you did not make any noise, you spoke very quietly, and you couldn't be overheard even in the corridor? (Well, friends, drink up! Break bottles! Curse at the top of your lungs! On that basis you will be considered reliable.) Answer: Well, what of it? Question: And you used to visit him too. And you said to him on the phone, for example: "We spent such an interesting evening." Then they saw you on the street at an intersection. You were standing there together in the cold for half an hour, and you both had gloomy faces and dissatisfied expressions; in fact, they even took photographs of you during that meeting. (The technological resources of agents, my friends, the technology of agents!) So what did you talk about during these meetings?

  What about? That's a leading question! Your first idea is to say that you've forgotten what you talked about. Are you really obliged to remember? So! You've forgotten your first conversation. And the second one too? And the third? And even your interesting evening? And that time at the intersection? And your conversations with C? And your conversations with D? No, you think: "I forgot" is not the way out; you will be unable to maintain that position. And your mind, still shocked by your arrest, in the grip of fear, muddled by sleeplessness and hunger, seeks a way out: how to play it shrewdly in a manner that will have some verisimilitude and outsmart the interrogator.

  What about? It is fine if you talked about hockey—that, friends, is in all cases the least troublesome! Or about women, or even about science. Then you can repeat what was said. (Science is not too far removed from hockey, but in our time everything to do with science is classified information and they may get you for a violation of the Decree on Revealing State Secrets.) But what if you did in actual fact talk about the latest arrests in the city? Or about the collective farms? (Of course, critically—for who has anything good to say about them?) Or about reducing the rate of pay for piecework? The fact remains that you frowned for half an hour at the intersection—what were you talking about there?

  Maybe B has already been arrested. The interrogator assures you that he has been, and that he has already given evidence against you, and that they are about to bring him in for a confrontation with you. Maybe he is sitting home very calmly and quietly, but they might very well bring him in for questioning and then they will find out from him what you were frowning about for half an hour at that intersection.

  At this point, too late, you have come to understand that, because of the way life is, you and he ought to have reached an agreement every time you parted and remembered clearly what you were going to say if you were asked what you had talked about that day. Then, regardless of interrogations, your testimony and his would agree. But you had not made any such
agreement. You had unfortunately not understood what kind of a jungle you lived in.

  Should you say that you were talking about going on a fishing trip? But then B might say that there was never any discussion of fishing, that you talked about correspondence-school courses. In that case, instead of causing the investigation to ease up a bit, you would only tie the noose tighter: what about, what about, what about?

  And the idea flashes through your mind—is it a brilliant or a fatal one?—that you ought to come as close as you can to the truth of what was actually said—of course rounding off the sharp edges and skipping the dangerous parts. After all, people say that when you lie you should always stay as close to the truth as possible. And maybe B will guess what's up and say approximately the same thing and then your testimony will coincide in some respects and they will leave you in peace.

  Many years later you will come to understand that this was not really a wise idea, and that it is much smarter to play the role of someone so improbably imbecile that he can't remember one single day of his life even at the risk of being beaten. But you have been kept awake for three days. You have hardly strength enough to follow the course of your own thoughts and to maintain an imperturbable expression. And you don't have even a minute to think things over. Suddenly two interrogators—for they enjoy visiting one another—are at you: What were you talking about? What about? What about?

  And you testify: We were talking about collective farms—to the effect that not everything had as yet been set to rights on them but it soon would be. We talked about the lowering of piece rates. . . . And what in particular did you say about them? That you were delighted they had been reduced? But that wasn't the way people normally talked—it was too implausible. And so as to make it seem an altogether believable conversation, you concede that you complained just a little that they were putting on the squeeze a bit with piece rates.

  The interrogator writes down the deposition himself, translating it into his own language: At this meeting we slandered Party and government policy in the field of wages.

  And someday B is going to accuse you: "Oh, you blabbermouth, and I said we were making plans to go fishing."

  But you tried to outsmart your interrogator! You have a quick, abstruse mind. You are an intellectual! And you outsmarted yourself. . . .

  In Crime and Punishment, Porfiri Petrovich makes a surprisingly astute remark to Raskolnikov, to the effect that he could have been found out only by someone who had himself gone through that same cat-and-mouse game—implying, so to speak: "I don't even have to construct my own version with you intellectuals. You will put it together yourselves and bring it to me all wrapped up." Yes, that's so! An intellectual cannot reply with the delightful incoherence of Chekhov's "Malefactor." He is bound to try to build up in logical form the whole story he is being accused of, no matter how much falsehood it contains.

  But the interrogator-butcher isn't interested in logic; he just wants to catch two or three phrases. He knows what he wants. And as for us—we are totally unprepared for anything.

  From childhood on we are educated and trained—for our own profession; for our civil duties; for military service; to take care of our bodily needs; to behave well; even to appreciate beauty (well, this last not really all that much!). But neither our education, nor our upbringing, nor our experience prepares us in the slightest for the greatest trial of our lives: being arrested for nothing and interrogated about nothing. Novels, plays, films (their authors should themselves be forced to drink the cup of Gulag to the bottom!) depict the types one meets in the offices of interrogators as chivalrous guardians of truth and humanitarianism, as our loving fathers. We are exposed to lectures on everything under the sun—and are even herded in to listen to them. But no one is going to lecture to us about the true and extended significance of the Criminal Code; and the codes themselves are not on open shelves in our libraries, nor sold at newsstands; nor do they fall into the hands of the heedless young.

  It seems a virtual fairy tale that somewhere, at the ends of the earth, an accused person can avail himself of a lawyer's help. This means having beside you in the most difficult moment of your life a clear-minded ally who knows the law.

  The principle of our interrogation consists further in depriving the accused of even a knowledge of the law.

  An indictment is presented. And here, incidentally, is how it's presented: "Sign it." "It's not true." "Sign." "But I'm not guilty of anything!" It turns out that you are being indicted under the provisions of Articles 58-10. Part 2, and 58-11 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Republic. "Sign!" "But what do these sections say? Let me read the Code!" "I don't have it." "Well, get it from your department head!" "He doesn't have it either. Sign!" "But I want to see it." "You are not supposed to see it. It isn't written for you but for us. You don't need it. I'll tell you what it says: these sections spell out exactly what you are guilty of. And anyway, at this point your signature doesn't mean that you agree with the indictment but that you've read it, that it's been presented to you."

  All of a sudden, a new combination of letters, UPK, flashes by on one of the pieces of paper. Your sense of caution is aroused. What's the difference between the UPK and the UK—the Criminal Code? If you've been lucky enough to catch the interrogator when he is in a good mood, he will explain it to you: the UPK is the Code of Criminal Procedure. What? This means that there are two distinct codes, not just one, of whose contents you are completely ignorant even as you are being trampled under their provisions.

  Since that time ten years have passed; then fifteen. The grass has grown thick over the grave of my youth. I served out my term and even "eternal exile" as well. And nowhere—neither in the "cultural education" sections of the camps, nor in district libraries, nor even in medium-sized cities, have I seen with my own eyes, held in my own hands, been able to buy, obtain, or even ask for the Code of Soviet law!

  [Those familiar with our atmosphere of suspicion will understand why it was impossible to ask for the Code in a people's court or in the District Executive Committee. Your interest in the Code would be an extraordinary phenomenon: you must either be preparing to commit a crime or be trying to cover your tracks.]

  And of the hundreds of prisoners I knew who had gone through interrogation and trial, and more than once too, who had served sentences in camp and in exile, none had ever seen the Code or held it in his hand!

  It was only when both codes were thirty-five years old and on the point of being replaced by new ones that I saw them, two little paperback brothers, the UK or Criminal Code, and the UPK or Code of Criminal Procedure, on a newsstand in the Moscow subway (because they were outdated, it had been decided to release them for general circulation).

  I read them today touched with emotion. For example, the UPK—the Code of Criminal Procedure:

  "Article 136: The interrogator does not have the right to extract testimony or a confession from an accused by means of compulsion and threats." (It was as though they had foreseen it!)

  "Article 111: The interrogator is obliged to establish clearly all the relevant facts, both those tending toward acquittal and any which might lessen the accused's measure of guilt."

  But it was I who helped establish Soviet power in October! It was I who shot Kolchak! I took part in the dispossession of the kulaks! I saved the state ten million rubles in lowered production costs! I was wounded twice in the war! I have three orders and decorations.